A Book of Bridges
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15 S73i- CORNELL UNIVERSITY LIBRARY " "^M/uLXiiaataf^ J^Uuafct w^^^^^msr^v^ ^^±tl^5=^^L. BCKTiggT FRAGILE DOES NOT CI RCULATE FRAGILE PAPER Please handle this book with care, as the paper is brittle. liij'ji'ji CASE FRAGILE DOES NOT PHASED CIRCULATE Cornell University Library ^ TG 15.S73 DPTERlORATfOM A book of bridges, Vm 3 1924 020 735 019 .i"-" Cornell University Library ^^ The original of this book is in the Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924020735019 A BOOK OF BRIDGES A BOOK OF BRIDGES BY FRANK BRANGWYN, A.R.A. AND WALTER SHAW SPARROW LONDON : JOHN LANE THE BODLEY HEAD *'^ NEW YORK : JOHN LANE COMPANY MCMXV MO- f] "lU^^l WILLIAM BRENDON AND SON, LTD., PRINTERS, PLYMOUTH, ENGLAND HISTORIC VITRY-LE-FRANCOIS, ON THE MARNK PREFATORY NOTE LITERARY projects may be put in two classes. Some are like steamers that go in a regulated course J direct to their destinations, while others tack here and there like sailing ships, governed by a zigzag pro- gress. The subject of bridges belongs to this latter class. For five-and-twenty years I have tried to order it into a methodised hobby. As well try to teach a hive of honey-bees never to visit certain flowers in a garden, and : vi PREFATORY NOTE never to fly beyond certain pathways and hedges. Yet a writer cannot help rebelling when his chosen theme declines to play in the game of authorship, and deviates from many careful plans which are made for its benefit. Every chapter in this book has been rewritten eight or ten times, yet my sailing ship has not become an Atlantic liner. My wish for a long time was to show the evolution of bridges in about seven hundred photographic illustra- tions, with eight lines of text under each print ; and in preparation for this work I collected materials, and received invaluable help from other pontists, particularly from Mr. Frank Brangwyn, Mr. H. T. Crofton, Mr. C. S. Sar- gisson, Mr. Edgar Wigram, the Rev. O. M. Jackson, and the Church Missionary Society. Pontist after pontist sent me notes, photographs, sketches ; and then Frank Brangwyn suggested that we should work in collaboration. Here was luck indeed ! His pictures and drawings would be the book of art ; and the rambling subject, if it passed over mere technique into the human drama, ought to interest the general reader who does generally read. For bridges have represented types of society, every change in their development having been brought about by changes in social needs. One thing more than any other is attractive to a pontist it is the varied strife that bridges and roads have circulated, not only in military campaigns, but in the thronged struggle for existence—the one incessant war in the affairs PREFATORY NOTE vii of men. A routine of idle sentiment prattles about an illusion named Peace, yet strife everywhere remains the historian of life, every effort to do and to live claiming a battle-toll of killed and wounded and maimed. Even sleep, the nearest kinswoman of peace, is united to the law of battle by dreams that torture. A pontist, then, when studying the strife that roads and bridges have distributed, must clear from his mind the fanciful ideas that pacifism has invented ; he is an adventurer in history, not an idler in a world of visions. To-day, above all, he is called upon to see the truth, because Europe, driven by the rival motive-powers of hostile ideals, has passed from industrial strikes and contests into other phases of necessary warfare. Once more differing civilizations will have their worth tested to the full on stricken fields ; and once more roads and bridges will dominate the military tactics and strategy. This great War broke out when my last chapter was nearly finished, and its early events illustrate and confirm the main arguments which I have tried to make as clear as possible, so that no person may think of bridges apart from their historic service to mankind. During many centuries, for example, all strategical bridges were fortified ; then a gradual decline began, and it culminated in the defenceless modern bridge that sappers blow up in a few minutes. Bridge-builders everywhere have much good sense to regain from the science of national defence, a very difficult science to-day, for many of its methods are being rendered viii PREFATORY NOTE obsolete by airships and aeroplanes. So a book on historic bridges could not be published at a time more opportune than the present moment. Several collectors have lent pictures, and their kind aid is acknowledged in the table of illustrations. W. S. S. November wth, 19 14. CONTENTS CHAPTER THE FIRST ON THE STUDY OF BRIDGES AND ROADS Section I. General Views, from p. 3 to p. 13. Section II. Strife and Historic Bridges, from p. 14 to p. 52. Section III. Custom and Conven- tion, from p. S3 to p. 84. Section IV. Controversies, from p. 85 to p. 106. CHAPTER THE SECOND ' MAN AS THE MIMIC OF NATURE . .107 Section I. Preliminary Considerations, from p. 109 top. 112. Section II. Among the Heralds of Man, from p. 113 to p. 124. Section III. The Slab-Bridge with Stone Piers, from p. 125 to p. 128. Section IV. Tree- Bridges WITH Stone Piers, from p. 129 to p. 132. Section V. Tree- Bridges WITH Timber Piles, from p. 133 to p. 135. Section VI. Some Typical Timber Bridges, from p. 136 to p. 143. Section VII. Primitive Suspension Bridges, from p. 144 to p. 149. Section VIII. Natural Arches—THEIR Significance and their Influence, from p. 150 to p. 164. CHAPTER THE THIRD A FEW WORDS ON THE ROMAN GENIUS 165 CHAPTER THE FOURTH OLD BRIDGES, EUROPEAN, PERSIAN AND CHINESE . .205 CHAPTER THE FIFTH ON THE EVOLUTION OF UNFORTIFIED BRIDGES . .329 ix X CONTENTS APPENDIX I fAGm CHINESE GABLED BRIDGES 3^5 APPENDIX II STEEP ROMAN BRIDGES ... 3^7 INDEX AND GLOSSARY 369 LIST OF COLOUR PLATES Frontispiece. PONT St. Benezet over the Rh6ne at Avignon. Built between the years ii 77 and 1185. National Gallery of Australia. TO FACE PACK Railway Bridge at Albi in France 8 Pont VALENTRfe at Cahors in France : the Fortified Gates AND Towers. Thirteenth Century. See also the second picture of this Bastille Bridge .16 The Alcantara at Toledo. Mainly the work of Archbishop Tenorio, A.D. 1380; fortified by Andres Manrique, A.D. 1484. Collection of Miss E. C. Rossignol . • 32 War-Bridge of the Middle Ages at Parthenay in France 36 Cannon Street Railway Bridge, London. Collection of the Fine Art Society ......... 48 Old London Bridge. Begun by Peter Colechurch in 11 76, and finished by a Frenchman, called Isembert, in the year 1209 . 52 Old Bridge over the Clain near Poitiers .... 56 At Albi on the Tarn in France. Showing on our right the Old Houses, and beyond the Bridge, on our left, the great Old Church, famous for its fortifications ...... 72 Tower Bridge, London. Collection ofJohn Lane, Esq. ... 80 Famous Bridge at Espalion in France. Said to date from the Eighth Century 88 Pont du Tarn at Albi in France. Said to date from about the years 1035-40 92 Pont de Vernay at Airvault, Deux-S^vres. Famous bridge with ribbed arches, French Romanesque Period, Twelfth Century 96 Old Bridge over the Aude at Carcassonne in France. Twelfth Century . .104 Gothic Bridge at Villeneuve-sur-Lot, France . .120 Ponte DELLA Paglia at Venice. Renaissance. Collection oj R. Workman, Esq. 152 Roman Aqueduct at Segovia in Spain 184 xi xii LIST OF COLOUR PLATES TO FACE PAGE Huge Defensive Bridge at Cordova in Spain. Originally Roman, but remodelled by the Moors in the Ninth Century. Recently so much repaired that it looks almost new . .188 Old Bridge with Houses at Kreuznach on the Nahe, Prussia 208 The Rialto in Venice. Designed in 1588 by Antonio da Ponte. Collection of the Fine Art Society . .212 New London Bridge. Designed by George Rennie, and carried out by his brother, Sir John Rennie. Opened to the public in 1 83 1. Collection of' Charles Holme, Esq. .220 Three-Arched Bridge at Venice, over the Canal of St. Giobbe. Brick and stone. Renaissance. Collection of f. Heaton, Esq. .......... 224 Gothic Bridge at Barnard Castle, Yorkshire . 232 Gothic Bridge with Shrines at Elche in Spain . 236 Old Bridge at Espaly, near Le Puy, in France . 240 Pont des Consuls over the Tarn at Montauban in France. Fourteenth Century ......... 256 Pont Valentre at Cahors-SUR-Lot. Thirteenth Century. See also the other picture of this Bastille Bridge .... 264 The Alcantara at Toledo. Showing the Moorish Gateway at the Town end of the Bridge. See also the other picture . 284 Spanish War-Bridge—the Bridge of St. Martin at Toledo. Its history seems to date from 121 2, but in the fourteenth century it was rebuilt by Archbishop Tenorio 288 Ponte Nomentano over the Anio ; a Medieval War-Bridge IN THE CaMPAGNA 296 Laroque on THE RiVER LOT, NEAR Cahors. A sort of inland Gibraltar ; a part of the village is built on bridges thrown across chasms in the rocks ......... 300 PONT Neuf AT Paris. Built in 1604, but much altered since the Renaissance .......... 320 The Tower Bridge, London. Albertina Collection, Vienna. See also the other drawing ........ 328 Pont Henri IV over the Vienne at ChAtellerault in France. Built by Charles Androuet du Cerceau, 1564-1609 . 332 Pont de Tours, France. Famous Bridge of the Eighteenth Century 344 On the Tarn at Millau in Southern France.